Finding Alice (Alice Clark Series) (9 page)

“We need to go. Can you give me a moment?” He brushed me off with his right wing. I thought that would offend me but the shiver it sent through my body made me not care so much. I nodded and stepped away. He watched me as I slowly retreated at his request toward a large rock that seemed out of place, even in that moment. I stepped behind it, my back to it, and slid down into the fetal position, clutching my knees for safety. I heard him whimper and a thump from his wings recoiling. My heart felt heavier than it ever had. I stared at the darkness and knew this was only the beginning of something much bigger than either of us.

Our final papers were due the next day. We had spent the last two days in complete silence. I had focused on my school work, unsure of what to say to him or how to fix the mess I made. The more I read on fallen angels in the Book of Enoch, the more it came to light Cole may have been holding a darker secret than his wings. The showcase for my artwork was the following week. I had turned in all of my work and my teacher was more than excited to show me off to the world. I, however, had never felt more like hiding from it. I hoped he didn’t stay angry with me forever. He was there with me but it was more like a shell of someone who used to exist.

He closed the laptop on the kitchen table and leaned back into a large stretch, cracking his back. I flinched from the sound; it reminded me too much of the sound of his bones breaking just two days earlier. He let out a huge laugh, breaking our two days of silence awkwardly, similar to laughing in the middle of a funeral. “We should probably talk about this,” he said.

I continued my blank stare in his direction. Did he just say that? After two days of nothing, now we could just talk about it like it was a scheduled topic to discuss in class? He stood us up and backed me into a wall. He reached up slowly, brushing against my waist until he reached my face. His lips rested on mine in a way that could only be explained as thirsty; so was I. I latched my legs around his waist.
We can talk later
. I just wanted to feel him against my skin.

He carried me upstairs to our room and we fell to the bed almost in slow motion as I attempted to catch my breath. He lifted my shirt above my head, only unlocking from our kiss for the second it took to get it past us. I imitated his move, removing his shirt as well. Everything that had happened in the last few days disappeared to the wastelands in that moment. I rain my nails down his back, which I knew makes him crazy. He kissed me down my neck to my shoulder. I attempted to hold in a moan. I opened my eyes to see a blanket of feathers once again hovering above us. He flipped me at a speed so fast, only I would have noticed I wasn’t straddling him a moment ago. He looked up at me and we stopped moving, completely still, staring now in each other’s eyes. I felt our souls intertwining as if they needed each other to survive. I fell next to him and we stared at the feathers. I smiled in amazement, taking in the beauty of it. I turned to him and watched his fears start to bubble up to the surface. I interrupted them with a wild, passionate, “Take me now” sort of kiss. The feathers fell as if there were an endless supply in my ceiling. He did just that—took all of me. We let ourselves get lost in each other.

I lay still in a field of golden grass. I looked around and shivered at the sight of the dark woods ahead. An electric current rushed through my fingertips and I felt Cole’s hand tangle into mine. We knew this wasn’t real and worse, we knew we would have to deal with the darker version of this place soon. He pulled me on top of him with one of those breathtaking smiles. I forgot that just a moment ago, we were in this same moment in our bed; but here we were in a field of luscious, golden grass that smelled like cinnamon. The voices lingering behind us became less daunting when our laughter filled the endless field. He ran his hands through my hair, keeping my face as close to his as he could. I could taste the breath escaping his lips. I closed my eyes as he came in for the taste of my tongue.

I opened my eyes and found us lying in my bed partially covered by my sheet, trying to catch our breath. I watched as the last of the feathers fell gently around the bed. I could feel his smile. I was sure he could feel mine too. I wished we could have stayed in that moment of heaven forever. There in that bed, there in that field. Either, really. We lay still together until our breaths regulated. I lifted my arms into a stretch and felt the weight shift on the bed as he got up. When I turned to him, he already had his boxers on. Looking at him in his boxers still made me blush, even after that. He leaned down and kissed my forehead. “Coffee?” he asked.

“It’s like you are reading my mind,” I teased. He left the room and I sat up, pulling my pillow into my lap and hugging it. The rush began to slip away and the lingering memory that was so distant gnawed at me. We did need to talk about all this. Well, except what just happened. I couldn’t stop grinning. I stood up, a little more wobbly than expected, and got dressed. Just as I buttoned my jeans, he entered with two steaming cups of delicious coffee. I saw him bite his lip as he handed me my cup. “Mmm. Thank you.”

We sat on the edge of my bed as we had just weeks ago, two souls still intertwined as if our destiny was to be together in this moment. I looked at him and saw his stare was elsewhere. I followed it to my jewelry box. He looked at me; I could see through this stare, at the gears turning in his head for the precise words to use.

“This is a complicated subject,” he blurted out, catching me completely off guard. I was expecting something a little bit more elegant than that.

I wasn’t expecting to talk about this so soon, after we just…
“I didn’t assume it would be easy to talk about,” I said.

“I’m not what you think I am. It’s dangerous for both of us for you to know any of this. But at this point, it’s not safe for you to be in the dark anymore, either.”

“Okay. What are you, an angel?”

“No. I’m what people call a
nephilim
.” The word rolled off of his tongue with such shame.

“I don’t understand.”

“Sure you do. You’ve been writing about it for two days for your paper. If you can believe I could be an angel, surely you can believe this is the truth.”

I nodded in agreement, trying to wrap my head over every strange moment that had happened since I met Cole. Similar things had happened to me my whole life, though; they had been intensified since he had come into the picture. I felt him watching me as I tried to put this unexplainable puzzle together, hearing his voice in my head as he heard mine too. I remembered the feather on his seat at the bar, which only made me think of my jewelry box filled with those that I had found throughout my life. Being attacked and not only surviving, but injuring a man twice my size; throwing him into my car hard enough to dent it could only mean one thing.

“I am too,” I said. The tone of my voice was questioning. He nodded. Panic started to take over my entire body. He tried to calm me but I pushed away his hand. “Do I have wings?” I felt ridiculous asking the question. Of course I didn’t. I was having a nervous breakdown.

“I don’t know, I’m afraid I don’t have very many answers for you.” He reached his hand out to me; I felt his rejection as I let it hover there. Finally, I took it. We sat there for hours talking about our very similar miserable childhoods.

“My last foster family wasn’t bad. I liked Jill but when she got pregnant, everything just changed. To see her so in love with someone she didn’t even know, seeing how she felt for her unborn child. I just don’t get how my parents could give me up…never even want to know me,” I confessed. Cole noticed my tension rise from talking about my past and immediately took it as a cue to tell his story, or part of it anyway.

“I met my father. I hated how much I looked like him. I just didn’t want to be like him. After growing up in foster care and eventually taking off to be on my own, he got in touch with me. I was angry. He waited until the hard work of raising me was over. He really only contacted me to tell me what I was, and… Well, I haven’t seen him since.” Cole ended with a hint of sadness and anger in his voice. In an attempt to alleviate the silence I grabbed my jewelry box to show Cole, though we both knew he’d opened it before this moment. He stared down at its contents and continued. “From what I understand, when we use our abilities, I guess we shed feathers just as if our wings were extended in some invisible way. From what my sperm donor told me, Angels, carrying out God’s will to remove all nephilim, use them when found as a sort of tracking system. Luckily for us picking them up is instinctual and keeps us hidden.” I shut the box in his hands and watched him hold back a groan.

“What?” I asked.

“You have this amazing scent. It reminds me of vanilla bean and butter cream. Your feathers smell like they are bathed in it.”

“I smell like
what
?” I began to laugh hysterically. “It sounds like you want to bake a cake with me.” That time, we laughed together. I took a deep breath of him in. “I get what you mean though. You have a scent too. Smells like ocean waves crashing on a sandy beach.” I blushed.

“I smell like fish?” He pulled me into his lap. “I’m kidding.” He ran his fingers down the side of my face and stole a kiss. “Can we continue this conversation later?” I answered with a kiss, pushing him backward and colliding into the bed.

Thursday morning came crashing in on my perfect and unusual last few days. It was the last day of our early religion class; really, all we needed to do was drop off our final papers. With the last few days, I really wanted to make a few adjustments to my paper. I pulled it out and reread it.

Though I agree the rebellious fall may have been malicious by some of the fallen angels, and may in fact deserve some sort of consequence, I do not agree with God’s punishment. Sending all the fallen only after Judgment Day to the abyss, all of the children and wives (sirens and nephilim) to be killed, seems unjustifiable. These women and children have human souls. Why are they being punished for something that they did not know they were choosing? It seems to cross some sort of invisible line that is as clear as a brick wall to me. I do not see a just, loving creator here. I see an angry, betrayed individual who not only allowed this to happen but then throws a tantrum when it does. Are the fallen really the villain in this story? Some, maybe, but not all of them.

Then again, maybe it was perfect just the way it was. I tucked it back in my bag and headed out the door, Cole inches behind me. We headed off to class together.

I stopped off at the art studio to talk to Tina about the showcase, but to no avail. It was locked and she wasn’t in her office either. No backing out of the showcase now. I left in defeat to meet Cole in the parking lot. I picked up the pace when I saw him talking to a girl, feeling foolish only seconds later when I saw it was just Camille. “There she is,” she beamed.

“Hey.”

“You two can tell me all about how your epic love affair is on the way to the bar.” She winked at me. I hated that.

Luckily, Camille opted for telling us about how bipolar her relationship with Jake had been instead of prodding us like lab rats. I wasn’t a very good friend; I wasn’t really listening to anything she was saying. Cole kept distracting me. I had never been so excited to go to work—as long as it meant she would stop talking about Jake’s drinking, which is what I was assuming she was talking about. We pulled up to the bar.
Finally.
I heard Cole let out a chuckle and Camille stared at him, completely confused.